A positioning technology is used to determine a geographical location of a terminal. Generally, the geographical location of the terminal may be determined by using a resource of a wireless universal network, for example, in a manner of positioning by observed time difference of arrival (Observed Time Difference of Arrival, OTDOA).
In an evolved universal terrestrial radio access network (Evolved Universal Terrestrial Radio Access Network, E-UTRAN) system, when one base station serves a terminal, a characteristic parameter (for example, signal field strength, propagation signal time difference of arrival, or signal arrival azimuth) of a radio wave propagation signal between the terminal and the base station is detected, to obtain a distance between the terminal and the base station, and then a circle is obtained by using the distance between the terminal and the base station as a radius, where it is considered that the terminal falls within a range of the circle. When multiple different base stations (for example, three different base stations: a base station 0, a base station 1, and a base station 2) serve a same terminal, distances from the base stations to the terminal are obtained first, where the distance from the terminal to the base station 0 is d0, the distance from the terminal to the base station 1 is d1, and the distance from the terminal to the base station 2 is d2; and then a hyperbola is formed by using a difference d1−d0 between the distance from the terminal to the base station 0 and the distance from the terminal to the base station 1, and another hyperbola is formed by using a difference between the distance from the terminal to the base station 1 and the distance from the terminal to the base station 2, where an intersecting point of the two hyperbolas is a location of the terminal. The terminal determines different radio wave propagation signals by using cell identifications (Cell Identification, CID) carried in the radio wave propagation signals.
However, with ongoing development of mobile communications technologies, signal coverage strength keeps increasing. In some hotspot areas or “black hole” areas, nodes for enhancing a coverage signal or increasing a capacity may be deployed, where these nodes have a same CID when these nodes belong to a same cell. Therefore, in the prior art, when positioning nodes (nodes that belong to a same cell) send radio wave propagation signals to a terminal, the terminal cannot identify the positioning nodes by using the received radio wave propagation signals. Therefore, positioning measurement performed by the terminal cannot be associated with a corresponding positioning node, and consequently the terminal cannot be precisely located.